


A Homecoming of Sorts

by habenaria_radiata



Category: Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Fluff, Humor, M/M, Post-Dragon Age: Inquisition, Pre-Dragon Age: Inquisition - Trespasser DLC
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-21
Updated: 2019-02-21
Packaged: 2019-10-28 16:58:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17791229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/habenaria_radiata/pseuds/habenaria_radiata
Summary: One particular rift carries a lot more than demons within it, as the Inquisitor soon learns.Fortunately, Skyhold can handle an extra guest or two.





	A Homecoming of Sorts

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cinereous](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cinereous/gifts).



* * *

   
  
    A well-timed thrust of Cassandra's shield was the only thing preventing the tips of his ears from breaking off like icicles from a cabin roof. He flinched and ducked lower beneath where her muscular arm had bent before his face. Even from here, he could practically feel the frost biting at the air. Cassandra's arm strained with the effort of holding the howling ice at bay, her teeth grinding so hard he could hear them under the dramatic howls of the demon and the tearing of wind against buckling metal.  
  
    “Would it be considered ‘irony’,” he muttered, nocking an arrow and peeking around the very edge of her shield, “if I said that Despair Demons enrage me?”  
  
    “I am the wrong person to ask, Inquisitor.”  
  
    That was likely fair. He slipped out from behind the safety of her shield right as the ice fell away. The respite was just enough for him to release his grip on the taut bow string, and his arrow pierced straight through the awful creature’s haggard face.  
  
    “I’ll ask Varric when we get back to Skyhold, then.” He turned sharply on his heel and jogged towards the writhing vortex of green still shimmering through the air. Familiar -- deeply, irritatingly familiar -- as the sight of a rift was, it had never quite crossed the line to mundane. Each one looked mostly the same. The helix of sickly green would twist the sky into strange shapes like a child’s toy, bending clouds and giving fleeting glimpses into the depths of the Fade from which it had erupted. Staring into one too long tended to make him feel ill, even this deep into his tenure as Inquisitor.  
  
    With a jerk, he thrust his hand up towards it, the mark already burning through his fingers. At this point, he’s closed so many rifts that he was confident he could seal this one in his sleep. The idea was too tempting to ignore, in fact. He imagined Cassandra would have an easy time carting him about the whole of Orlais while he dozed, flinging his limp hand in the direction of any lingering rifts. That would be quite the sight. Let them try to call him the Herald of some shem tart after that nonsense.  
  
    “Are you quite alright, darling?”  
  
    Vivienne’s incredulous voice cut through the still air. Lavellan blinked, jarred from his questionable reverie. She did not have to say ‘some time today’ for the words to be perfectly clear in her tone.  
  
    “Right. Sorry. Just a moment.” He shook his hair from his face and steadied his arm again when a face appeared in the rift with so little warning that he leapt directly into Cassandra’s arms. Or tried to, at any rate. A thoroughly undignified squeal burst from him before he could swallow it, and he watched with wide open eyes as a human body followed the face and slid out of the Fade to collapse onto the grass.  
  
    His entire party was silent for several seconds. Each of them stood there ineffectually as the man struggled to one knee, his broad chest heaving under labored breaths. “Well, someone say something. This can hardly be the most awkward entrance any of you have ever seen.”  
  
    “Hawke?!” he sputtered. “Is that really you?”  
  
    The Champion of Kirkwall responded with a heavy chuckle that crackled as if his lungs had been packed with dirt. “Inquisitor. It’s been awhile.” Though the edges of his entire body were wreathed in the most intense exhaustion he’d ever seen, Hawke still had enough energy to lift his head and toss a smarmy wink his way. “Smart lad, by the way.” His thick fingers closed around the wooden body of his staff, but try though he might to right himself, he couldn’t get much further up from the ground than balancing on one knee afforded him. “It’s good instinct to question anything you see tumbling out of the Fade, if a little hypocritical. Go on. Ask me something only the real Hawke would know.”  
  
    He and Cassandra stared at each other for a moment, then canted their heads only a fraction towards the beleaguered Champion. The iconic red smear across his nose was scarcely visible beneath the dirt caked on his skin.  
  
    “H- how are you alive? How are you here?”  
  
    Again, Hawke laughed, and again, it was punctuated by a choking sort of cough as his fingernails dug into his staff. “That runs rather contrary to the spirit of my question, but not the letter. Let’s just leave a little to the imagination and say I’ll be picking spider leg hair out of my teeth for weeks.”  
  
    “Ugh.” The rictus of disgust that flashed over Cassandra’s pale face was too much for him. He laughed before he could swallow it. At the very least, it shattered whatever spell had them all so useless in the face of an injured man. Lavellan started forward and crouched down to catch Hawke before he collapsed.  
  
    The Champion was fading fast. He’d left him behind so long ago that he couldn’t be certain this wasn’t some elaborate fever dream manifested from months of guilt. “Here. We’ll get you back to Skyhold as quickly as possible. Just don’t die on me a second time, or Varric really might disown me.”  
  
    Gripping at Hawke’s wrist, he tugged his arm around his neck and supported him at his waist, but they didn’t make it very far before both their knees began to buckle. Hawke was about twice his size and thick with muscle, despite being a mage and someone who had apparently sustained himself on little more than giant spiders for a dragon’s age.  
  
    Cassandra took his other side before he could drop him. Together, they got him onto the back of his mount, Hawke's bright blue eyes closed and his body slack with exhaustion. “Inquisitor,” he murmured. His lips were cracked, and Lavellan had to lean in close to his face to hear the man at all.  
  
    “Some time today.” Hawke jerked his black head back towards the rift still curled lazily in the air, another slew of demons tumbling out of it.  
  
    Then he chuckled and went still, succumbing to hardships that they could only begin to imagine.  
  
    Sympathy twinged through him as sharply as a head of one of his own arrows. He could not believe it. He’d survived. Hawke had actually survived.  
  
    The slide of metal from a scabbard alerted him to Cassandra’s presence. She was still shaking her head as she charged at a freshly materialized Rage Demon. “He is _exactly_ as I imagined,” she muttered. It made him laugh again.  
  
\---  
  
    The low murmur of voices roused him from the dark of sleep. Hawke turned his head slowly, pressure pulsing from one end of his skull to the other, squeezing at his brain until he could do little more than grunt in both annoyance and discomfort.  
  
    So many voices blurred together like melting wax that he couldn’t make out any distinct words. That would be rather counter-intuitive were he still in the Fade. They liked to needle at you. Ruthlessly exploiting all one’s deepest fears and insecurities was difficult to do when the spooky, disembodied chorus could only mumble like it’d just spent all night on a Hanged Man bender.  
  
    Plus there was a bedroll beneath his head. The Fade would not have been kind enough to give him a pillow. Unless the pillow was going to turn into spiders, or something.  
  
    A flood of cold shivers stole down the bare skin of his back, but his body was so heavy he couldn’t lift it. Or do more than turn his head. He had to admit, as far as eternal punishments went, this was a surprisingly effective one. Lying poised for spiders to nest in your hair and being unable to do anything about it was a lot more horrifying than it seemed like it ought to be.  
  
    The heavy tang of medicinal paste was a bit of an interesting direction to take, however, and it distracted him from his looming thoughts of arachnids. His eyebrows furrowed deeply. That smelled like elfroot. Sharp, but herbal and thick. A strong but clean sort of scent. And his pillow had yet to turn into spiders.  
  
    Hawke cracked one eye open. There beside him was the body of another man, evidently sleeping on a bedroll in a small, dark room with a few openings in the stone filtering in gentle sunlight. To think the sky wasn’t even green.  
  
    Slowly, he rolled his head to the other side and closed his eyes once more. This was not the Fade. This was home of the Inquisition. Skyhold. He distinctly remembered Varric smuggling him in here on the sole condition that he run screaming from any muscular black-haired women.  
  
    Ah. That’s right. He’d given that poor Inquisitor quite the scare. Hawke would have to find the time to make fun of him later. That girlish squeal had been one for the ages.  
  
    Another sharp fragrance hit his nose, ripping him from his idle recollections. Hawke’s eyes snapped open as the familiar smell of polished metal blanketed him. This one was even sharper than the elfroot, one that reminded him of the edge of a blade coated with coppery blood.  
  
    All he could see was a skinny thigh. Hawke blinked heavy eyelids. Trying to move his neck sent a fire scorching down to his shoulders, but he ignored it and compensated by turning onto his side instead. The person beside him was utterly still, his legs outstretched and his arms curled loosely about his middle. One of his hands rested up close to his knee, and his breathing was smooth and even. Asleep, likely.  
  
    Hawke’s gaze was held fast by the red sash tied around his wrist, a well-loved crest draped against the metal of his gauntlets. How long had it been? Too long.  
  
    Slowly, every inch another blistering reminder of agony, Hawke pushed his head back to look up at the man’s face. He was indeed asleep, his eyes closed and his head tilted onto one shoulder. White hair brushed across the flat bridge of his nose and his cheeks, but his eyelashes were dark as pitch. He’d stared at them so many times, but it did nothing to dampen how his heart swelled at the sight of those delicate shadows against Fenris’ cheek.  
  
    “Oh, thank the Maker. You’re finally up.”  
  
    Fenris jerked awake, his neck craning up at the woman casting a shadow over Hawke’s body. He followed the man’s gaze and blinked dozily up at the sister eyeing him with both arms akimbo. “Yes, finally,” Hawke muttered. His throat felt thick with mud, but what was a little cracked skin when there were jokes to be made? “What patience you’ve had, tending to me while I faffed around like a layabout. Very kind of you.”  
  
    “The Seeker told me you’d be a smart arse.” The sister rolled her eyes, but she nevertheless bent to one knee to begin checking him over. Evidently satisfied with what she saw, she bustled away from him. Hawke wasted no time turning his attention back to Fenris, who was watching him with fierce green eyes.  
  
    He did not move to speak. Hawke followed his suit, relaxing there on the floor and taking a soft breath. Finally, he opened his eyes a smidge and peered up into his favorite face in all of Thedas. “You ought to tell her to work on her bedside manner,” he whispered.  
  
    Fenris cocked his head sharply, his face twisting. Then he laughed, warm and rich and so sweet that Hawke wanted to bask in it like sunlight. “I’m sure she’ll take your criticism to heart.”  
  
    He preened in the trailing off of Fenris’ laughter. “I missed you.”  
  
    “So much you elected to stay behind in the Fade?”  
  
    At that, Hawke frowned and made a face at him. “You know me. I never miss an opportunity for heroics. It was all very dramatic. You should have been there. I told him to tell everyone how my beard rippled in the breeze. He told you that, didn’t he?”  
  
    It was not among the most skillful jests he’d ever managed. Hawke flinched, half-expecting Fenris to be offended or unmoved in the face of his transparent humor. Instead, fingers sifted along the roots of his hair, and he opened his eyes further to see Fenris leaning over him.  
  
    “I was told you had died.”  
  
    “Please. Thedas has tried everything to get rid of me. If a dual-wielding Arishok couldn’t send me to the Maker’s side, a little jaunt into the Fade is practically a vacation.”  
  
    One of Fenris’ dark brows arched smoothly. “Practically a vacation?”  
  
    “Yes, practically. You weren’t there. Then it would have been a proper one.”  
  
    Fenris laughed for him again, ducking his head and shaking his hair out of his eyes. It had gotten longer. Hawke lifted a hand, trailing the tips of his fingers along the fringe. “I see,” he murmured. Hawke had missed the sound of his voice.  
  
    “Can you sit?”  
  
    The question took Hawke by surprise. His hand slipped away from Fenris’ cheek, and he groped at the stone floor a moment. “Yes.” With Fenris’ help, he pushed himself up and swayed a bit. “I’m alright. Would be better if our dear sister had left me a bit of water. My voice hasn’t cracked this much since my balls dropped.”  
  
    He could hear the disapproving snort of the chantry sisters without even having to see their faces. Fenris laughed all the more, and he slid his fingers around Hawke’s bicep. “Let me help you stand. We can fetch you some water and find the room we’ve been offered.”  
  
    “Yes, please,” someone called.  
  
    Hawke found himself frowning again. He swiveled towards the woman, moving unsteadily to his feet with Fenris still supporting the majority of his weight. “You don’t have to sound so thrilled to be rid of me. How bad a patient can I possibly have been? Do I snore?”  
  
    “Yes--” she snapped.  
  
    “You do,” Fenris supplied helpfully.  
  
    “--but I was referring to that awful hound. It refuses to budge. Kindly leave my infirmary before another of my sisters trips over it.”  
  
    A gasp rushed out of him. Hawke staggered to the door to see Dog sitting perched on the grass right in front of the building, his nub of a tail thumping against the earth. “Dog!” The instant Hawke came into view, he launched himself to his feet, nearly bowling him over in his attempt to lick his face.  
  
    “Did you have fun with Fenris?” he crooned, both his hands curling around Dog’s massive maw. His tail slapped yet harder at the air behind him in all his canine delight. Hawke accepted his slobbery kisses with grace. “You missed me more than Fenris did. He didn’t even kiss me.”  
  
    “I thought I would wait. The Inquisitor said you had spider hair in your teeth.”  
  
    Arse.  
  
    Just for that, Hawke let go of Dog. He spun back towards Fenris and hefted him up into the air, relishing his grunt of surprise.  
  
    He kissed him hard, to the chorus of scandalized chantry sisters, the happy braying of Dog, and a courtyard full of people muttering about the strange barbarian manhandling an elf.  
  
    “Where is this room we’ve been ‘offered’?” He spoke against Fenris’ lips. Though he could easily overpower Hawke if he so chose, he was terribly indulgent of him. He relaxed in Hawke’s arms with his feet dangling above the ground.  
  
    “The Inquisitor stopped by the infirmary. He said we were welcome to use his quarters. He’s to be traveling. He also noted it’s ‘the least he could do for...’”  
  
    “For?” Hawke set the man down when his arms began to scream in protest.  
  
    Fenris lifted his shoulders. “I don’t know. He looked at my face and then elected not to say.”  
  
    “I cannot imagine why.” A wicked grin seized him. He could feel the split in his lower lip pull savagely, but his mirth was far too much for him to stop. “Lead the way, please. I’m eager to see it. And to lie down again. I feel like a newborn Hart.”  
  
    And sleep on something other than a bedroll. Or Fade rocks.  
  
    Once on his feet, Fenris made a slightly sour face and scrubbed the vestiges of Dog’s second-hand kiss away from his chin. “He did. But I don’t believe the invitation extended to Dog.”  
  
    “What sort of hospitality is that?”  
  
    Together, they made their way across the grounds, Fenris’ arm at his waist and Dog trotting at his hip, leaving massive paw prints in the dirt. As far as homecomings went, Hawke could not even be certain this counted. Skyhold was certainly not his home. He was a tourist at best, popping in to re-traumatize everyone before vanishing from the face of all Thedas.  
  
    But he couldn’t think of a better welcoming party.


End file.
